Data warehouses have long been essential tools for business intelligence and analytics teams within large companies, but they have typically been seen as too complex, too expensive, or unnecessary for small businesses. We strongly disagree with this viewpoint and believe that a data warehouse can provide substantial ROI for all companies. Accessing and implementing a data warehouse has never been easier and more affordable.

Here’s the info you need to get up to speed on data warehousing and the advantages it can bring to your small business.

What is a Data Warehouse?

A data warehouse serves as a centralized and organized home for your data. It stores data generated by the various systems you use (ex. ecommerce platforms, CRMs, Excel, etc.) and combines it into datasets relevant to your business. It then facilitates the flow of this data to the reports and applications your business relies on. A data warehouse is endlessly flexible and provides you unrestricted access to your data.

What Can I Do with a Data Warehouse?

There are countless use applications of a data warehouse, but here are a few key use cases.

Automated Reporting + Dashboards

Data warehouses can integrate with all major spreadsheet and data visualization applications. Automatically refresh the data backing spreadsheet based reports or connect your data to a tool like PowerBI to build custom dashboards for your team.

Workflow Automations

Send automated emails or IMs to team members with daily KPIs. Automate customer data entry within your CRM or other marketing systems. Alert team members to customer issues or abnormal trends.

Predictive Modeling + Forecasting

The data in your warehouse can be used to build financial forecasts that help plan your business. It can also be used to build predictive models (ex. customer specific product recommendations) that help scale your marketing efforts.

What Does it Take to Set Up a Data Warehouse?

Data Pipelines

You’ll need to connect each of your business systems to the warehouse with a data pipeline. These pipelines ensure that the data in your warehouse is up to date and accurate.

The cost of building a pipeline is entirely dependent on the business systems in question. If you use popular systems that have well documented APIs, costs could be minimal. If your systems don’t provide APIs, this could be more expensive.

Data Models

While not required, modeling your data (structuring it into clean datasets) can help you get the most out of your investment. If your company has customer data from both an ecommerce system and a CRM, taking the time to construct a singular “customer” table would make building reports easier and more impactful.

The cost of modeling your data is dependent on the complexity of your business and the systems you use. Data modeling also requires collaboration between stakeholders and developers to ensure the data sets meet business requirements.

What Does it Take to Maintain a Data Warehouse?

A well designed warehouse can largely run autonomously, but errors do occur from time to time. Error notifications systems are an important part of a healthy warehouse. We recommend having access to a technical partner you can trust to address issues when they arise.

If you bring in new data systems (maybe you replace your ecommerce system), you’ll need to take the time to integrate it with your warehouse. You’ll need to build a new pipeline and update any relevant data models.

Lastly, you’ll also have to pay for the computation required to keep the warehouse running. Most small businesses can maintain a data warehouse using common cloud service providers (ex. AWS, GCP, Azure) for less than $75 a month.

What's Next?

At Intero Analytics and Automation, we believe that the investment in a data warehouse pays for itself. Having full ownership of your data in an organized, centralized, location enables unlocks endless growth opportunities for your business.

Interested In Learning More?